Amidst turbulent political, economic, and technological waves, the journalism and media industry continues to navigate a year that could completely reshape its landscape. Against this changing backdrop, the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism has released its annual report on journalism, media, and technology trends and forecasts for 2025, revealing the contours of the future based on a survey of 326 senior leaders at media organizations across 51 countries.
The report not only identifies challenges, from the rising influence of social media platforms and the ascendancy of influencers, to the penetration of artificial intelligence and referral networks, to audience migration and shifts in funding sources, but also offers a “survival plan” that can ensure the resilience of journalism in this turbulent era.
How will the rules of the game change? And what strategies do industry leaders deem essential for adapting to the future? We explore these questions in the following paragraphs.
The Future of Journalism: Under Pressure, But Not Yet Quiet
The decline in confidence among media leaders regarding the future of journalism continues. The number of those confident in the future of journalism dropped from 47% in the Reuters 2024 report to 41% this year. Conversely, the number of those unconfident in the future of journalism rose from 12% last year to 17% this year.
Key concerns centered on political polarization, increased attacks, particularly from politicians, on the press, the economic crisis, and escalating legal restrictions aimed at controlling traditional media. This comes at a time of shifting towards social media at the expense of traditional media, as clearly demonstrated in the recent US elections, where both candidates used social media platforms to address the public via podcasts and YouTube.
The Populist Winds and Their Impact on Journalism:
Reports indicate that approximately 2,500 media jobs will be lost in 2024 in major markets, in addition to the 8,000 jobs lost the previous year.
In the United States, CNN has lost about a third of its audience since the election and is preparing for widespread layoffs. In Switzerland, the public broadcaster SRG SSR faces a new referendum that threatens to halve its funding.
The BBC is also facing staff and news program cuts.
2025 Trends and Predictions for the Future of Journalism
US President Donald Trump’s escalating attacks on the media include cutting federal funding for public media outlets and fact-checking organizations, which Trump considers a form of censorship.
The Trump media model, which employs social media and populist tactics while marginalizing traditional media, is being replicated globally by politicians worldwide who are increasingly aware of the importance of social media and are seeking to build alternative media networks to disseminate their messages through digital channels—Romania being one example.
Disruption in Search and a Collapse in Traffic
After traffic from Facebook (down 67%) and Twitter (down 50%) collapsed over the past two years, publishers fear that Google—one of the most important sources of website traffic—may be next this year.
Three-quarters of survey respondents (74%) are concerned about a potential decline in referral traffic from search engines, although there is no evidence of a drop in traffic from Google Search so far.
Google Discover, which delivers personalized news links via Chrome and the Google app, saw 12% growth last year and now generates more traffic than organic search.
However, the emergence of new AI players, most notably Search GPT and Perplexity from OpenAI, as competitors to Google with their AI-generated summaries of user queries, could impact news website traffic.
These automated news services have sparked considerable anxiety among journalists and news publishers about their future and role in this new ecosystem. If the public can access summaries of top content for free, why would they click on publishers’ websites? Will any revenue generated by AI platforms be sustainable? Will it compensate for the significant loss of traffic?
Google, for its part, has begun taking steps to integrate AI into its search engine to keep pace with developments and meet the challenges of competition, especially given the success of AI companies in attracting many major media outlets.
Search and AI: How will referral traffic change in 2025?
Legal pressure is mounting, with renewed calls expected to compel platforms to pay fair compensation for the use of news content.
The emergence of collaborative intermediaries like ProRata.ai, which pays fair compensation to publishers by determining the value of each article’s contribution to AI-generated summaries, is also on the horizon.
Social Media Platforms: A Cat-and-Mouse Game
In this fast-paced and uncertain environment, publishers remain undecided about their relationship with Big Tech. A third (31%) want to strengthen ties, another third (31%) want to sever them, and the remaining third (36%) are looking to maintain their current status.
The Video Explosion and New Players
Notably, publishers have increasingly invested in video networks like YouTube, then TikTok, and Instagram, which has also been promoting more short-form videos through its algorithms.
However, there are numerous challenges facing publishers looking to invest more in this area. Key takeaways:
Video production is not easy for many print newsrooms.
Monetizing short-form videos remains difficult, with little chance of driving traffic back to websites or apps.
The explosion of content on networks like TikTok, including automated and synthetic news, will make it even harder to distinguish original publishers’ content this year.
Journalism and Social Media: Will the Game Change in 2025?
PrioritiesNew for publishers:
Building relationships with AI platforms like OpenAI and Perplexity.
Turning to alternative channels. There’s a growing focus this year on channels like WhatsApp and LinkedIn, followed by Bluesky with strong competition, and then Google Discover, which has become the primary source of referral traffic for many publishers.
A significant reduction in effort on Facebook, as it has become a less useful place for journalists and an increasingly toxic platform for the public, according to the publishers surveyed.
The social video explosion: With the public’s growing appreciation for shorter formats, the report anticipates seeing more publishers bring this content to their websites and apps.
The Economist and the BBC are among those who have built carousel videos into their homepages, while others are embedding vertical videos within stories or commissioning reporters to deliver situational comedy for the website, as seen on the front page of The Times.
More bans and restrictions on social media. TikTok has already been banned in several countries, including India, due to concerns about Chinese government influence and its potential impact on young people. The report also anticipates further legislation in other countries aimed at restricting access to networks targeting younger demographics, following Australia’s ban on social media for those under 16. This could potentially extend to the X platform and Elon Musk, who may face further fines or bans.
Sources of Income and Revenue: Will We Return to Print?
The shift towards reader-centric funding models continues, moving away from mass-market advertising. Survey results show that subscriptions (77%) are the primary source of revenue, surpassing display and embedded advertising.
Only media organizations that excel in the quality of their content, its relevance to their audience, or their ability to cultivate a close relationship with it will succeed.
News organizations are striving to diversify their revenue streams, with most relying on three to five different revenue channels, while also attempting to create additional revenue streams that include related services such as training and marketing.
Some smaller publishers rely on product sales as a supplementary source of income, and in some European countries, traditional commercial media outlets depend in part on government subsidies to support local or public interest journalism.
Emerging platforms like Substack and YouTube are competing with traditional media for consumer share, following a significant increase in news subscriptions in recent years.
How will media organizations thrive in 2025?
The survey revealed that 44% of publishers prioritize product innovation, development, and the introduction of new services to drive growth. They aim to replicate the New York Times model by developing new products that can be included in comprehensive subscriptions, and the Guardian model, which launched a cooking app (Feast) and plans to add product reviews in 2025. 42% of respondents plan to launch a new product targeting young people. Between a quarter and a third of publishers are considering launching products in the audio (26%) or video (30%) sectors, while others plan to invest in new areas such as gaming (29%), education (26%), and food (13%).
The biggest shift expected comes from platform funding, which includes AI deals, revenue-sharing programs, and fact-checking contracts.
Support from philanthropic funds and foundations is also expected to become a more significant source of revenue, especially given the pressures facing independent journalism.
We are expected to see more partnerships between organizations that are not part of the same media group. For example, subscribers to major European brands like Politiken and FAZ will gain access to The New York Times for a limited time as part of their subscriptions.
More media companies are planning to invest in audio content (read articles, audio summaries, and podcasts) by integrating it into their websites and apps.
A return to print is also emerging as part of a hybrid strategy with online presence. Many publishers will reconsider print as a communication channel less subject to the dominance of social media algorithms. The Atlantic magazine plans to increase its annual publication from 10 to 12 issues, returning to a regular monthly format for the first time since 2002.
Generative AI and Newsrooms: Invasion or Collapse?
Over the past year, news organizations have begun to understand the full implications of generative artificial intelligence (GI) for journalism and its operations. In some of the larger newsrooms, at least, guidelines have been largely established, and specialized AI roles have been created, as last year’s report predicted.
[Read more: Reuters Digital News Report 2024: The Future of Journalism vs. YouTube, TikTok, and Influencers] AI-powered news summaries have proliferated through apps like Particle.ai and Grok.ai, raising concerns about their impact on news website traffic.
Most survey respondents feel that newsrooms are undergoing some transformation (63%) or a complete transformation (24%) thanks to generative AI, while only 12% say there is little change—or no change at all (1%).
Regarding the uses of generative AI in journalism, this year’s report shows that the focus remains on back-end efficiencies, with 96% of participating publishers saying this will be very or somewhat important in the coming year. This is followed by using AI to improve personalization and recommendation (80%), then content creation (77%), and newsgathering functions (73%) such as fact-checking, data-driven journalism, and investigative reporting.
Will AI write the future of journalism?
2025 Predictions!
An AI-Powered Content Explosion.
Sora, the text-to-video conversion program launched by OpenAI late last year, is expected to put new capabilities in the hands of millions of ordinary people. This will lead to an increase in generated content that may be difficult to distinguish from real content.
Our social media feeds across various platforms are already filled with artificial content this year. According to a recent study, more than half of LinkedIn’s long-form posts are already generated by AI.
There are fears that the rapid spread of “low-quality copied content” will leak into the training data of large language modeling institutions (LLMs), leading to what is known as model collapse. More focus is expected on using AI to transform content and create versions in different formats tailored to different audiences this year. Most publishers (75%) plan to convert text-based articles to audio (in multiple languages or tones). Furthermore, smart summaries at the top of articles (70%) are likely to become more prevalent, and over half (56%) plan to implement AI-powered search functionality to engage with their audience. Nearly a third of publishers (36%) are looking to experiment with converting text-based stories to video, and this may even extend to chat functionality within the article.
Smart Agents and Conversational Interfaces
One of the most interesting developments likely to emerge in 2025 is the advancement of smart agents that can work for you, searching for tasks, scheduling appointments, invoicing clients, and even purchasing gifts for relatives. At least, this is the vision behind services like Apple Intelligence, which also promises to protect your data and privacy in the process. Gartner predicts that by 2028, 15% or more of daily business decisions will be made by independent agents.
Influencers and the “News Industry”
Getting news from influencers is a reality, especially for Generation Z, and has become a growing global trend in several countries. They blend humor with investigative reporting, offering fresh perspectives on the news with an entertaining twist, moving away from traditional, boring formats. However, most (77%) lack prior journalistic experience and don’t bother to fact-check their news before sharing it with the public. Furthermore, according to a Pew Research Center study, they have promoted extremist views on several occasions.
A separate report from UNESCO showed that 62% of influencers said they do not verify the accuracy of their content before sharing it with their followers.
This picture is further complicated by the increasing migration of prominent journalists from traditional media outlets to social media platforms in search of independence. These talented individuals seek greater control over their content and direct, unrestricted interaction with their audiences.
Influencers and Traditional Media in 2025: Self-Interest Rules!
The report anticipates increased collaboration between traditional media and influencers, a mutually beneficial exchange and a search for the missing piece of the puzzle. Influencers benefit from brand credibility, while brands, in turn, benefit from the influencer’s popularity, creativity, and audience reach that they themselves cannot access.
Media brands may replicate Le Monde’s strategy of attracting younger audiences by directly employing influencers to manage social media channels on platforms like TikTok and Snapchat.